Baxters Narrative of His Life and Times, Appendix · Section 1 · Letter 3 – Letter 4
Mr. Iohnson's Second Letter to Mr. Baxter.
SIR,
I Have here enclosed sent you back the Papers which I borrowed of you, and I have been so scrupelous in sending them back exactly the same as they were first sent to you, that I have not so much as mended some Errata which I observed (in the Copying them over) to have slipt my Pen when I wrote them first.
I have since I received my own Papers, perused the Answer which you make to them; but what I am like to return, I cannot guess: For I cannot yet tell whether you have satisfied my Arguments or not. This I know, and shall not be ashamed to confess, that if you have, I have not yet Wit enough to understand you. But before I will say you have not, I will a little more consider your Answer, and try my own Reason a little farther. Only this I will venture to say in the mean time, that if I can any whit judge of my own Heart, I never enquired more unbiassedly after any Truth, than I do after this present Question; and therefore I do not doubt, but if Light be before me, I shall at length see it, though for the present it be hid from me: For as I said (if I know my own Heart) I can sincerely say, that in this Question I could be well content to find the Truth, though it ran cross against every Line in my own Papers. But I must needs confess, if I have Truth on my side in this Question, and after the most diligent Examination which I can make, it shall still appear that to plead for an uninterrupted Succession be of absolute necessity for the justifying of our Ministry, I shall never dispute the other Matters with the like indifferency. For in this combat I could be content to take a foyl, and it is in a manner all one to me, whither of us get the better. But in the other matters which I am after to proceed upon, I have many temptations before me to be afraid of owning Truth, if I should meet with her out of my own Quarters. And therefore beside the Pains which it will cost me to discharge the Task, the very Fear which I shall be in least I should miscarry in the Managing, makes me more than willing to take a Supersedeas here. But if this cannot be done, you shall have the rest which I promised, performed in the same order as your self have stipulated, viz. before I make any Reply to yours, I shall endeavour to discharge the three other Particulars which remain behind, and all in due time from,
SIR, Your Fellow-labourer, and Enquirer after Truth, M. Iohnson. Wamborn, Octob. 6. 1653.
For my Reverend, &c. very worthy Friend, Mr. Baxter, Minister of the Word at Kidderminister, These.
Mr. Johnson's Third Letter to Mr. Baxter.
SIR,
IN my late Letter which I sent you, I told you, That I could not resolve my self whether you had answered my Arguments or not, but intended to try my own Reason a little farther, before I would say positively that you had not. And now upon further Consideration, I return you this to your whole Discourse: 1. Whereas you say to my first Argument that it was necessary for our English Bishops to prove an interrupted Succession against the Papists, because they might thereby argue ad hominem more strongly against them. I answer, That such learned Men as I have had the luck to meet withal, do not intend their Arguments or their Pains to any such end, and I prove that sufficiently thus. Because they that do use such kind of Replies do usually frame their Answers thus: 1. That there is no necessity of such a Succession. But, Secondly, If there was a necessity, yet the nullity of our Calling would not follow, because we can prove such, a Succession. But say I, the learned Authors which I have hitherto met withal, have no such Concessions: And because you seem often to hint some such thing, I desire you would point me out to some English Bishop, who having written about this Subject, do concede, that a Succession in Office, or a Succession of legitimate Ordination is not necessary. And I do the more confidently require this from you, because I have it from*Dr. Hammond in his Six Queries. p. 367. one who is much better acquainted with Authors than my self, that the Socinian Faction were the first that ever owned that Assertion. And if he be able to make good what he saith, you gain as little Credit by abetting such a Faction as they are, in your Assertions, as we get by abetting the Papists, while we plead for the quite contrary.
But Secondly, Whereas you deny the Consequence, and tell me that all which they thought necessiary is not necessary, they being not infallible. I answer, that you lay more stress upon my first Argument than I intended: For I never intended to argue thus: That therefore it was infallably necessary because they thought it necessary, but that it was a good inducing Motive to persuade that it was a matter of more consequence than your Papers made of it, since learned Men took so much Pains about it: And though this indeed will not extend to a Demonstration, yet it may serve as far as I intended it, viz. as far as an Argument will reach, drawn only from that inartificial Topick a Testimonio, which you know in all contests is familiarly used, and not to be rejected if the Testees be Men of Worth and Learning. And if so, then this Argument will stand good so far as it will serve, or was intended, notwithstanding any thing that hath been said to the Contrary.
To the Second Argument, Whereas you doubt not to say, That if you answer me well in this, you carry the whole Cause afore you. I shall so far gratify you as to acknowledge that you have sufficiently answered it, though I must also profess that I cannot find wherein you have given a formal answer to it. For the Apex, or the Quick of the Argument (as you are pleased to phrase it) was laid down in this Proposition [That there is no where in Scripture such a Form of Words as these. [That they that are thus and thus qualified may Preach the Word.] Now to this you answer, That there is quod sensum. And I reply, That this will serve my turn, if you do but make it out: But I say, that I cannot find it in your Papers. You urge six Particulars presently, from whence, I suppose, you intend to do it. But at length, your self fall beside the Question in the winding them up. For whereas you say, that the Form in the Law was not only thus: [That they that Preach the Word must be thus and thus qualified;] but [That they that are thus and thus qualified may be appointed to Preach the Word] I think you are beside the Question. For I did not engage you to prove that there were in Scripture such a Form of Words as this: [But they that are thus and thus Qualified shall be appointed to Preach] but [That Men thus and thus qualified may Preach the Word, or have in being so qualified, Authority to preach the Word.] betwixt which two Propositions I conceive there is much Difference: It is one thing to say, [That they that are thus and thus qualified may be appointed, that is, may have Authority given them to preach the Word.] And it is a far different thing to say, [That they that are thus and thus qualified may preach or have de facto Authority to Preach, being so qualified]. And being used as Mediums in a Syllogism will produce very different Conclusions. For Example, Suppose we could find such a Form of Words in Scripture as these, [That they that are thus and thus qualified may preach the Word:] And make this the Major in the Syllogism. Then any single Person or Individuum as could infallibly frame himself into the Assumption thus, [But I am thus and thus qualified] might infallably also make out his Commission to preach into this Conclusion: Ergo, I have Authority to preach the Word. And without any thing to do with further Ordination might presently go about the Work: The Word giving him his Commission, and I confess were there such a Form, would be a sufficient Medium to convey Authority as a sufficient Discoverer of the Will of God concerning such an Individuum. But then, if there be only such a Form as this; [They that are thus and thus qualified shall be appointed to Preach the Word:] Then any single Person or Individuum, having first fitted himself into the Minor thus, [But I am thus and thus qualified] could make no other Conclusion but this: Ergo, I may be appointed to Preach the Word; which Conclusion, as I never did deny, so it is little Advantage for you to have proved: For the Question is not whether the Word doth direct who shall be appointed to Preach: But whether the Word doth immediately, by an immediate Application of something immediately, by an immediate Application of something in its self to an Individuum, conveigh Authority into that Individuum to Preach, so as there shall be no need of further appointing or commissioning from Church-Officers: which it would have done if there had been such a Sense in the Word … required. But no such matter, though there should be such a Sense as you produce: For I cannot yield that which you conceive we are both agreed in; viz. That when the Word hath described the Qualifications of the Minister, that then there is no more to do but to discern or judge who is the the Man that hath those Qualifications; for though the Bishop should judge such or such an Individuum to be fitly qualified for the Ministry, as discerning the Qualifications which the Word requires in him; yet till he hath by Imposition of Hands, Fasting and Prayer, set him a part for the Work, he is yet no Minister to my understanding, whatever he may be to yours.
But, Sir, I confess, though you have not formalitur answered this Argument, yet you have given me so much Light from your most excellent Discourse which you make from your quinto to the End of this Second Arguments Reply, that I can answer it my self. And therefore I shall, as I said at the beginning, acknowledge that you have both satisfied it, and my own scrupulous Mind about this Question: And I do fully consent with you, that though the Succession of Ordination might be interrupted, yet we may draw our Authority from Christ by the Mediation of the written Word, or indeed by the very Law of Nature, which was a thing I confess I had not (as your self seems to tax me) duely considered. But now, having well weighted what Stress both Laws lay upon all Men to do what good they can when they have an Opportunity and there be a necessity of their Help. I do not doubt but a Man may have a sufficient Discovery of the Will of Christ calling him out to Duty, and by Consequence giving him sufficient Authority for that Work, though he may want the regular entrance into it. And therefore since I see a way to justify the Ministry, and to derive our Authority from Christ, though the Succession should be interrupted (though also in the mean I think all Men alive may be defied to make full Proof either that the Succession ever was, or ever shall be interrupted) I shall neither trouble you nor my self any farther about a business to so little purpose. But superceding from all the rest of my promised Task shall only add something concerning your Reply to my third Argument; and that is this: To my Question that I make in the Behalf of the Invaders of our Office, why we Clamour so much against them, why we give them not the Right Hand of Fellowship? you answer, We do not, we may not give them the Right Hand of Fellowship, because they come not into the Vineyard by the Door. But I Reply from your own Principles that it is for them morally impossible to come in by the Door, the Door to them being by Providence nailed up: The Men which you call Church Officers being either such as will not give them a Commission, or such as they dare not take a Commission from, as conceiving them not lawful Ministers, and because they cannot have their Orders from them salvâ conscientiâ, it becomes impossible to them, quia omne turpe & inhonestum est impossibile. And so, though you say, nothing is more untrue, yet to me, nothing seems more evident, than that the case of extream Necessity is their case. The Anabaptist for Example; he cannot be ordained by a Bishop, he dare not, because he judges the very Order to be Antichristian: The Presbytery, if he have any better Opinion of them, yet they think so ill of him, that they will not give him Orders. Either therefore, though he be never so well qualified for the Work, he must take his Call from the Company of Brethren, or he must take it upon his own discerning the Qualifications in himself, or he must not Preach at all, though he sees the Church of Christ have never so much need of his Help. Now if you say that in such a Case a Man may not bury his Talent when the Church hath need of his Help, and he an Opportunity to give it; but he may either take it upon himself, or the People may be the Judges to call him out to it, or the Magistrate either. Then they have the same Authority which we must have if the Succession be interrupted, and the Door of the Vineyard nailed up by Providence: and so their Authority seems built upon your own Principles. Now to all this if you say, that it is their Error to be Anabaptists, and it is their Error to Judge the visible Ministry of England to be no Church-Offices, and that it is their Duty to quit themselves of these Errors, that they may be in a Capacity to receive Ordinations, and the Presbytery in a Capacity to Ordain them, as you do in effect say. To this I answer, that I think, as well as you, that these are their Errors, and that these Errors ought to be laid aside. But yet, this being said, doth not absolve them from the case of extream Necessity which I speak of. An erroneous Conscience binding as strongly as a sound; and an Error appearing Truth, lays as great a Necessity upon the Party to frame his Practise to it as Truth: And so the Necessity becomes still as importunate. Methinks this Answer which you give may be made …y Papists to us Protestants, and by the Episcopal Party to you Presbyteries, when we tell the Papists, that we dare not take Orders from them, or the Presbyterian tells the Episcopacy that they dare not take Orders from them: How easily may the Papists say to us, it is our Error? how seriously may the Episcopal say to the Presbyterian, it is your Error? You create Impossibilities and Necessities upon your selves by your erronious Consciences? But if we Protestants cannot reject that Necessity which lies upon us of refusing Orders from the Papists: or if the Presbyterian cannot reject the Impossibility that lies before them of taking Orders from the Prelates whilst their Conciences tells them they may not. Why may not the Sectary upon as good Ground, and as justifiable Principles refuse Orders from the Presbyterian, and plead as strongly a moral Impossibility and a nailing up the Vineyards Door by Providence, whilst their Consciences tells them they may not; and so baulking those that we call Church Officers enter as regularly into the Ministry, or at least as inconfutably as any other Men, if the Succession be interrupted? And therefore I cannot think that you have answered this Argument, except the two first Lines contains it; where you say, That the best things may be made use of as Occasions to encourage Men in Sin, &c. because I think that there is much Truth in that, and that the Inconvenience which this Argument hath hanged upon that Assertion, is but incommodum per accidens, which may be fastened upon most of the Truths of God; I supersede likewise in that Answer to my third Argument. As for my Fourth Argument, I confess it was frivolously urged to the present Question, and I have wondered at my self how I came to hoole it in under the present Debate; and therefore I will return you nothing to what you have said against it: But giving you many Thanks for that Help which you have held out to my Understanding towards that weighty Question of justifying the Calling of the Ministry; I beseech the Almighty long continue your Life to the Advantage of his Church. And this done, without further Ceremony, I bid you farewell, and rest
Your Fellow Labourer in the Gospel of Christ… M. Johnson. Wamborne, Nov. 9. 1653.
For my Reverend, &c. very worthy Friend, Mr. Baxter, Minister of the Word at Kidderminister, These.